Tuesday, June 05, 2012

Bangkok 2012

Reason for calling it "In The Land Of Sweat" was because the weather was crazily hot!

Sweating the moment we stepped out of hotel everyday.

This is my third trip to Bangkok, but still a lot places I've never been to so was feeling excited about this trip.

Not really good start of the trip because...

Normally, the pilot will report saying where we are heading, how long is the journey & bla bla bla...

This time round, the pilot started off by saying this will be his LAST trip (he's retiring).

In our mind were like, "DAMN! I DON'T WANT THIS TO BE MY LAST TRIP!"

Fine, it was alright and went to the runway. Halfway through (before taking off), the plane went back to the starting point where we board the plane. Here comes the announcement informing us there will be a delay of 20mins. We waited........ the whole delay until it took off was about an hour!

SUAY OR WHAT?

Anyway, of course we still reached Bangkok safely!

First time experience taking the airport linkway.

There are quite a lot of people taking the train!

And, the train seats are so uncomfortable. The depth of it is just too small.

This is the token/coin (whatever you call it) for taking the train. Quite cute...

We had a hard time finding a hotel which provide room for triple sharing.

Most of the hotels need to pay additional 600-800 baht per night for additional bed.

Finally found one which was reasonable for the price & decide on this: Hotel De Bangkok.

Sorry for the messy room photo. This was taken on Day 2 when everything was in a mess!

Here comes the review or rather complaints!

L O C A T I O N

Hotel website mentioned it was close to the airport linkway, 5-10mins walk.

Yes, 5-10mins doesn't seems far but definitely not under the burning hot sun!

From Hotel to Pratunam area is walking distance of about 15 mins! Believe me, you wouldn't want to walk this distance under the sun.

Before going, I said I don't mind the location of this hotel despite knowing it is a little far.

I'm changing my words, I DO MIND! Comparing to Citin/ Budacco, I'm sorry Hotel De Bangkok but I'll choose them over you.

T H E H E A T

The moment we stepped in our room, OMG! the heat in the room was terrible!

First thing: ON AIRCON, but you know what?! The air coming out was warm!

Then Yvonne went to wash her feet, but heard her screaming because the water was hot too!

I'm not saying WARM but HOT, burning skin kind of hot. We checked with the hotel staff and they said because of the hot weather, the water piping are outside so the water will be hot (some more we are staying at the highest level). I felt that reason for experiencing the heat in our room is mainly due to the poor material they used to build this hotel. I've never experience this kind of situation in other hotel.

This is really HORRIBLE!

Just the above two factors are enough to stop me from booking the hotel again.

Although I do like the size and design of the room, really nice and comfortable for three people but that's just not strong enough to make me patronize again.

Ohh.. on a side note, the safe was spoilt on our 3rd night there. We were unable to unlock/open the safe and giving us a shock! With the help from the staff, we managed to open it but somehow not able to use it again.

Even thou we were in Bangkok but we still can't forget about our beloved bubble tea!

Each of us got a cup of Mr Shake! Cheap and good!

Without hesitation, we headed to Platinium's Food Court to have our lunch.

All had the same: Kway Chap! The stall is always so smelly but I love their rolled kway.

Since this is already my third time there, I'm not taking that much photos of the shopping places.

I cut that all out and moving on to our dinner place!

My first time going Siam Paragon.

sua gu right? who never go to siam paragon before?!

We were looking for Greyhound Cafe but turned out to be "Another Hound Cafe".

Anyway they are the same, just that this is another branch of it.

FYI, this is more high class than Greyhound Cafe. Do a comparison later on for yourself because we went Greyhound Cafe on another day too! :)

I supposed this area is for desserts but I believed you can request for the desserts menu even if you are sitting at the other area.

See the setup of the place, it is more towards fine dining. Whatever la, we used our hands there! Hahaha :)

FREE BUN!

This chicken wings are amazing! Damn crispy and yummy!

I'm not a "chicken wing" lover but I love these! I'm definitely going back for moreeeee :)

Rayne said that the calamari are nice but I thought they are pretty normal.

Here comes our main course...

The pasta are good too! Do keep a lookout for the pasta I'm gonna intro later on. That will be from Greyhound Cafe. Somehow the menu is slightly different for the two branches.

Siam Paragon Night Market.

From Siam Paragon, just walk towards the BTS station. It is directly opposite of Siam Paragon.

Walking through the crowd, sweating and tired.... none of us bought any clothes from the night market. All we bought were just accessories. Damn failed!

It's kinda hard to bargain there. Someone actually showed a black face when I tried to ask for discount.

Perhaps it's just not our style?! Because Rayne managed to buy a lot of clothes here!

Having bad fringe day when we decided to take some photos before starting our day!

Thanks to Fennie's camera, we can still camwhore a little.

Hello! I am Sunflower Suk Jin! Hahaha!

Shopped around Pratunam then went to had lunch at Saeb x2!

They are famous for wanton noodles. I don't really know how much a bowl of it cost but should be $2-$3 for a really small bowl! Trust me, you can finish 2 bowls of it easily.

Quite different from Singapore style.

The typical wanton noodle in Singapore comes with sauce which is quite watery (like soya sauce?!).

Or maybe the famous one will be Pontian, dry with dark black sauce.

However the Bangkok one quite little sauce or don't really have sauce but still quite nice.

If you have tried FeiFei wanton noodles in SG, it is something close to that.

We went back hotel to rest a little and put down our things before heading out to Chatuchak (CTC).

Check out the massive crowd

The accessories shop which we spent most of the time in.

I'm pretty fast at choosing because I don't really need to get presents or gifts for many people.

Esp when my two bffs, Singyee and Vonne are always going Bangkok.

Since I'm done choosing so decided to take out my camera to snap some photos.

Thanks Fennie for volunteering to take a picture for me! Hahaha! :)

I think these "bird cages" are beautiful but got no idea what to do with them if I buy it...

Yvonne wanted to try the coconut ice cream. Initially we didn't wanted to have it but it turned out to be very nice! Just that none of us actually eat the coconut "meat".

I think I'm going back for more for this! :)

We spent about three hours just shopping the main street of CTC. We didn't really went into the lanes.

Quite a pity but all the shops were closed by around 6-7pm.

We moved on to Union Mall. I used to like the place because there were really many nice shoes but this time round, I can't find any. BUT, there are really nice blazers selling there! I was procrastinating for too long whether to get one of the blazer because it cost 700baht.... in the end still didn't get it.

The famous waffle in Hong Kong can be find in Union Mall!

We had the chocolate one and it tasted good!

We planned to have Seoul Grill for our dinner.

Not expecting it to close at 9pm, we left with no choice but to have MK Steamboat for dinner.

It was quite late so some of the food were sold out but it was a healthy meal!

No rice for all of us!

Mostly were veggies, mushrooms, fish cake and some meat balls.

The marinated pork/chicken tasted damn good!!! We wanted to have another few plates of it but they had closed their cashier. :(

Great Info on your trip in 2012. I just visited Hotel De Bangkok, Pratunam. Its near to Airport Rail Link, and yes Pratunam market is on other side of Railway. Its fine. I think if visit in This month. Bangkok is cloudy and good weather same London. So I love this place.

Also I book Hotel De Special offers from there official Hotel Site - Click Here. Its cheap price and budget friendly place. I will visit again Bangkok. Its much more to see and do..